The Impact of Formative Assessment on English Language Learners at University Level

Abstract

This study investigates the impact of formative assessment on English language learners at university level. In this regard, the study explores benefits of incorporating formative assessment on university students’ achieving English language proficiency in all four skills – reading, writing grammar and speaking. This study is carried out on the first year students in Core English Language (CEL) lectures conducted by the Department of English Language Teaching, Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka. The existing procedure of holding ‘Continuous Assessment’ (CA) throughout the semester is taken into consideration with the aim of identifying its effects on English language learning process of undergraduates. The main objective of this research is to find ways and strategies to enhance English language proficiency and communicative competence of students at Sabaragamuwa University. Two groups of first year students were involved in this study as the experimental and the comparison. The students in the experimental group learnt English under techniques of formative assessment whereas the other group under comparison had language exercises and activities in a conventional English language learning setting. Pre-test post-test design is used as the methodology of this experimental research. Proficiency levels of the two groups were compared through the results of pre-test and post-test. In addition, through student behaviour observation and a questionnaire survey, students’ perceptions towards formative assessment were considered. The results of the study revealed that there is a considerable gap in the way students performed during the pre-test and the posttest. The experimental group revealed better performance in the pre-test than the comparison group; however the comparison group indicated better achievement only in the post-test. Finally study revealed that using formative assessment in Core English Language lectures proved positive influence on the learners’ proficiency in all four skills in English as opposed to the existing evaluating procedure of CAs because of its exam-oriented nature